“Marriage is so dumb.” – Whitney
While Whitney Cummings has been in show business for a few years now, I think it’s fair to say she’s still a relative newcomer to the television scene. Given her status as “new blood” in the network sitcom world, it’s somewhat confounding that her namesake show, Whitney, would feel so old-fashioned.
Whitney is a traditional multi-camera sitcom, which is a departure from the current trend of single-camera comedies. Multi-camera shows, like I Love Lucy, The Cosby Show, Seinfeld, and Friends, are shot in front of an audience and often feature a much higher “joke per minute” ratio than their single-cam brethren. For decades, the multi-cam set-up was the preferred filming method for sitcoms. Really, it’s the only way an ensemble cast can perform in front an audience, while also being captured on tape from multiple angles. In the 2000s, multi-cam shows began to fade away (with some notable exceptions, of course) and were replaced by single-cam sitcoms. These new wave sitcoms — The Office, Arrested Development, Curb Your Enthusiasm, It’s Always Sunny In Philadelphia, 30 Rock, Modern Family, and Community for example — did not use studio audiences or laugh tracks. The result is a more naturalistic look and the ability to escape from the “set-up, punchline, set-up, punchline” pattern that so many sitcoms in the past have relied upon.
With so many of the best comedies of the modern era utilizing the single-cam method, it’s actually rather jarring when you watch a new show that doesn’t use this style. Whitney Cummings basically acknowledges that her decision to use a laugh track and to shoot the show in front of an audience is a controversial one. After the opening credits run, Whitney’s voice pops in and says, “Whitney is taped in front of a live studio audience… You heard me!” It’s an interesting decision for a first time show creator to break with convention and look to the past for inspiration. And if the show didn’t suck so badly, it would be commendable. As it stands, however, the awkwardly laughing studio audience simply serves as a reminder that audience at home is supposed to be laughing but isn’t.
The pilot episode is about Whitney, a photographer, and her live-in boyfriend Alex (Chris D’Elia) trying to re-energize the sexual component of their long-term relationship. The real crime Whitney commits isn’t choosing to film in front of a studio audience or having some of the jokes fall flat, it’s completely failing to utilize Chris D’Elia. I love Chris D’Elia — his Stankowski character single-handedly made TBS’ Glory Daze worth watching. I was really excited to see him get a shot at a starring role on a sitcom, but man, oh man does Whitney turn him into a bore. It’s not that Alex is unlikable, per se, it’s just the writers seem intent on stripping him of his essential Chris D’Elia-ness. It’s a real shame, actually.
The other supporting characters are hit or miss. Whitney’s girlfriends Roxanne (Rhea Seehorn) and Lily (Zoe Lister Jones) don’t make much of an impression in the pilot, aside from being somewhat annoying. I know that one of them is single and boorish and the other is married and prim, but I have no idea which one is which. The only character who gets consistent laughs in the pilot is Alex’s crass, cop friend Mark (Dan O’Brien). I will admit that I chuckled when he offered a to give a chick a “ride-along on [his] face,” but his multiple caveman references wore thin after a little while.
This review originally appeared on TV Geek Army.